Chirac intervenes as riots spread in Parisian suburbs
The violence, sparked initially by the deaths of two teenagers, has exposed the despair, anger and deep- rooted criminality in the poor suburbs, where police hesitate to venture and which have proved fertile terrain for Islamic extremists.
The rioting, which spread on Tuesday night to at least nine Paris-region towns, has exposed rifts in Chirac’s government, with Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy - a potential 2007 presidential candidate - being criticised for his tough talk and police tactics.
It also has renewed debate about France’s failure to fully integrate its millions of immigrants, many of whom are trapped in poverty and grinding unemployment, living in low-cost, sometimes decrepit, suburban housing estates where gangs dealing drugs and stolen goods sometimes are in control.
That Chirac intervened personally was a measure of the crisis.
He acknowledged the “profound frustrations” of troubled neighbourhoods but said violence was not the answer and that efforts must be stepped up to combat it.
“Zones without law cannot exist in the republic,” the French leader said.
In a sixth night of violence across troubled suburbs around Paris on Tuesday night, police clashed with angry youths and scores of vehicles were torched in at least nine towns.
Police in riot gear fired rubber bullets at advancing gangs of youths in Aulnay- sous-Bois - one of the worst-hit suburbs - where 15 cars were burned.
Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy told Europe-1 radio that police detained 34 people. The minister recently called the rioters “scum” and has vowed to “clean out” Paris’s troubled suburbs.
“I speak with real words,” Sarkozy told Le Parisien newspaper. “When you fire real bullets at police, you’re not a ‘youth’, you’re a thug.”
No trouble was immediately reported in Clichy- sous-Bois, where rioting began on Thursday after the accidental deaths of two teenagers electrocuted in a power substation where they hid to escape police. A third was injured.
In a bid to open a dialogue, Sarkozy met with victims’ relatives, other youths, a police representative and officials from Clichy-sous-Bois.
But the unrest spread even as they met.
The riots have also made clear the frustrations simmering in poor housing projects to the north and northeast of the capital, heavily populated by North African Muslim immigrants and marked by soaring unemployment.
